February 02, 2017

Raid In Yemen

U.S. military officials told Reuters that Trump approved his first covert counterterrorism operation without sufficient intelligence, ground support or adequate backup preparations.

As a result, three officials said, the attacking SEAL team found itself dropping onto a reinforced al Qaeda base defended by landmines, snipers, and a larger than expected contingent of heavily armed Islamist extremists.

So now Trump is expected to weigh in on the appropriate level of ground support?!? And maybe eyeball some satellite photos? As Allahpundit notes. General Mattis, now SecDef, has some experience here. Gen. Dunford, Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and National Security Advisor Flynn, formerly a Lt. General who oversaw raids like this for a living, were also in the final meeting. Please.

IMHO the Commander in Chief approves these missions, or rejects them, based on the possible rewards and any risks associated with the country in question (Yemen, here), other allies, and US and world opinion. If the Defense Department submitted a half-baked plan after months of effort, well, that's on them. More reasonably, these are dangerous missions and sometimes things happen. E.g., the last known raid in Yemen, Dec 2014, failed to rescue the targeted hostages:

US special forces soldier is killed in Isis hostage rescue mission in Iraq

Almost done. Back to AllahP:

What’s missing from any of the reporting is the suggestion that Defense warned the Trump White House that they weren’t ready to roll but the White House demanded action anyway. Until that evidence is produced, why should we assume that Trump is the negligent party?

OK, into the Bonus Round for outrageous reporting. Here is the Guardian, picked up by The Week:

Saturday's Navy SEAL raid in Yemen — which resulted in the death of an 8-year-old American girl and a U.S. naval officer — had previously been rejected by former President Barack Obama, The Guardian reports. President Trump approved of the raid in his first military strike as commander-in-chief:

[Colonel John] Thomas said he did not know why the prior administration did not authorize the operation, but said the Obama administration had effectively exercised a "pocket veto" over it.

A former official said the operation had been reviewed several times, but the underlying intelligence was not judged strong enough to justify the risks, and the case was left to the incoming Trump administration to make its own judgment. [The Guardian]

The raid was greenlit by President Donald Trump shortly after taking the oath of office, but multiple officials told CNN the mission had been planned months in advance and had been briefed to then-President Barack Obama.

Both defense and Obama administration officials said the operation was never vetoed by Obama and that "operational reasons" were why it was pushed back after January 20 and why Obama left the task of authorizing the raid to his successor.

People want to believe and the media wants to give their customers what they want. Unexpectedly reality-based reporting from the NY Times on this.

WHAT TIPPED THE BAD GUYS? Why did our troops lose the element of surprise after arriving by helicopter five miles away? Speculation in the Times:

In this case, the assault force of several dozen commandos, which also included elite soldiers from the United Arab Emirates, was jinxed from the start. Qaeda fighters were somehow tipped off to the stealthy advance toward the village — perhaps by the whine of American drones that local tribal leaders said were flying lower and louder than usual.

Through a communications intercept, the commandos knew that the mission had been somehow compromised, but pressed on toward their target roughly five miles from where they had been flown into the area. “They kind of knew they were screwed from the beginning,” one former SEAL Team 6 official said.

Too many eyes in the sky making too much noise? Plausible? Surely we have done this lots of times.

Comments

Momto2 - this morning I wished for a photo and you heard. What a sweetheart Kate is.

DebinNC is unfortunately right. Right now, the Germans are focusing on Trump instead of their own growing imminent danger. No one gets to name the Islamic cuckoos in the nest. It easy to see how the Germans got to where they are given the country's past. I cannot understand the US. Bomber Billy's dream has become our
reality. May he land on the Lathe of Heaven soon.

My sisterthe nurse (who has an old pick-up) helped me move some large items from the old house today. (Extension ladder, garden cart, etc.)

Anyway, we were talking about this whole protest thing and she said the HOSPITAL is divided. Two women anesthesiologists went to that stupid women's march. (This indicates to me that as someone theorized most of those women had made reservation and flight plans because they assumed they would be going to Hillary's inauguration.

One of the surgeons keeps needling people and trying to stir stuff up because he likes arguing. (I will get my surgeries done only by Trump supporting doctors and anesthesiologist, I have decided.)

Anyway, sshe said she thinks its a combination of the media slanting things and people not able to accept that things didn't go the way they wanted. Her opinion is that they will have to figure it out themselves.

When someone says something, she says, "I don't know if that's right, because I heard it really was the opposite." Then she goes on to tell them that there are both sides pushing their view and they should keep that in mind, because you don't want to get fooled.

She leaves it at that, hoping a few will check out Fox or the actual damn White House web site.

Meanwhile, in Indianapolis, the deputy mayor (a democrat) made a tweet using a racial slur (beginning with n) criticizing the black people who showed up at the White House for the beginning of black history mony, also calling them "sell-outs."

Our big local talk radio hosts are outraged and are demanding he be fired. So far, the mayor has done nothing. Also, this deputy mayor is from new York and apparently has links to Sharpton.

This city is pretty tolerant, but I think Sharpton-style crap will mean that Mayor Hogsett gets booted out in 3 years. Ugh.

It is rarely reported but occasionally I see articles mentioning the rise in certain diseases that were previously non-existent or extremely rare in the U.S. This mcr-1 gene is pretty frightening as there is no antibiotic that will touch it. Does anyone doubt the CDC would play down these reports if they were linked to illegal immigrants?

As a nurse, I can tell you this is the thing that will turn Liberals against Illegal aliens. When Anti-Vaxxer's children are no longer protected by herd immunity and start dying from Pertussis or crippled for life from Polio, they will then realize another good reason for vetting immigrants, all but to late.

For those ginormous salaries, the IT brothers must have been hired for more than just keeping the systems going. They were working for Democrats, for Gaia's sake, who always want to something on the Stupid Party. Taking home more than paperclips brought in the feds. Otherwise this arrangement would have stayed in place. As was asked, who hired the merry band of brothers and who authorized the handsome salaries?

Off to the end of Catholic School Week Cocktail party at the old Polish Hall in Southampton. Used to be the Lady of Poland Catholic School until we decided to merge all the schools into Our Lady of the Hamptons. Great crowd. Lots of booze and food. [Hey, we're Catholics, okay?] and dancing.

Tomorrow Frederick reads the 1st Reading and announcements. Only if I can get him up.

I would just like to point out how hypocritical (as if we didn't know) the democrats are.

They took his money.
They attended his parties and ate his food.
They clamored to be in photos with him.
They had him as a cameo star in movies and TV shows.
They attended his wedding.

But once he entered as a Republican candidate, he became literally Hitler, according to them. The only thing that changed about him was that he was a candidate. He has been talking about the same issues since very early in his career, as can be seen in his interviews with people like Oprah and Phil Donahue on YouTube.

In turn, Mark Levin has been very critical of the inner circle's dearth of historical knowledge re populism and conservatism, shortfalls in ability to understand the difference between socialist initiatives and initiatives that have constitutional integrity.

Did you listen to him last night? I thought he gave some fundamentally sound criticisms about some strange statements without badmouthing anything DJT's done.

We just returned from the funeral I mentioned earlier. It was the most emotionally draining experience in many years.

Matthew was 23 and committed suicide, just couldn't manage the gremlins bouncing around in his head.

25 years ago his brother, at the time the youngest of three boys, died in his sleep. He was a Down's syndrome baby and aspirated on vomit in his crib. He was a delightful little tyke that I used bounce on my knee.

Their father Craig has been a friend for maybe 30 years. He is a musician who studied cello and piano. He studied piano in Milan and then taught concert pianist at the Mozarteum. Truly a world class talent, but that wasn't what he was most passionate about.

For all the time I have known Craig he has made a living as a sacred choral music composer. He owns a music publishing company that was willed to him, the only person the former owner trusted to take the business forward.

If you have a chior at your church, they almost certainly know Craig's music and have likely performed some.

Today at the funeral, three different choral groups from Capital University, where Craig is a professor, sang. A total of 7 pieces composed by Craig. One in particular was composed in memory of another young person who took their own life.

Senior White House advisor Stephen Miller and others like to compare President Trump to Andrew Jackson and William Jennings Bryan. He and Steve Bannon are pushing this Democrat protectionist stuff and likening Trump to Andrew Jackson. However, Jackson would never have supported Trump’s protectionist policies. Why is Miller skipping over Reagan to compare to Trump to Jennings Bryan who was on the left socialist wing of the Democrat Party?

Also late on Thursday DJT made a strange statement warning Israel about not building any new settlements.

As far as the Jackson stuff, it is more an anti-elitist mentality, of which I approve.

I haven't seen anything to compare him to William Jennings Bryan, but I could have missed it.

My sister used to listen to Levin every night. She now wishes they would take him off the air, because he is so negative.

I am all for reasonable criticism, and would like to know more about that settlement comment.

As far as the rest, I do not consider populism incompatible with conservatism. If we people are not listened to, then what is the point of voting?

Populism has 2 streams: leftist type envy-based redistribution type stuff, and conservative-based theories which the elitists have ignored. The latter is the type Trump is espousing.

Simply because he says stuff which is popular, with the portion of the country which voted Trump in doesn't make him some sort of danger.

What action has he taken which isn't conservative? Maybe Ivanka's child care plan, which hasn't been enacted yet. As far as I am concerned, that one is horse-trading and it will be up to Congress to accept or reject it.

What else has he got to complain about? So far he is way ahead of Bush 43.

As I am certain it was intended to be by they who spun the newsfeeds on the subject.

Through NYT and WSJ filters it's fake news.

Here's my filter from Breitbart:

"Here is the exact wording of the White House statement on Thursday (emphasis added):

'The American desire for peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians has remained unchanged for 50 years.

While we don’t believe the existence of settlements is an impediment to peace, the construction of new settlements or the expansion of existing settlements beyond their current borders may not be helpful in achieving that goal.

As the President has expressed many times, he hopes to achieve peace throughout the Middle East region.

The Trump administration has not taken an official position on settlement activity and looks forward to continuing discussions, including with Prime Minister Netanyahu when he visits with President Trump later this month.'

"The New York Times pounced on the phrase 'may not be helpful':

" NYT---->In the most startling shift, the White House issued an unexpected statement appealing to the Israeli government not to expand the construction of Jewish settlements beyond their current borders in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Such expansion, it said, “may not be helpful in achieving” the goal of peace.<----end NYT"

" Breit--->The statement is only “startling” if one is unaware of the history and geography of the region. In fact, the statement tacitly accepts all existing settlements. (One wonders when the penny will drop, and when the Times editorial page will attack Trump for provoking Middle East tensions with the same statement.)"

Breit--->"Recall, too, that Obama insisted on a complete “settlement freeze,” including expansion within existing settlements, and later allowed the UN Security Council to declare the entire Israeli presence beyond the “1967 lines” — including the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem — a “flagrant violation” of international law. The Trump administration’s statement is a complete reversal of the Obama administration’s policy.<----"

Both men are curmudgeons to the extreme. And heaven forbid a caller disagree with them. LOL

I remember calling Dr. Savage re the numbers of enslaved Africans in the 18th century south while the Constitution was being written. My numbers differed from Dr. Savage's. He chewed me out on the radio and hung up on me.

I heard him tirade about me because I lived in Berkeley. He was fulla shitake. LOL

I still listen to him. And I even reminded him of that call when I ran into him one night in Sausalito in '99.

Also, it occurs to me that I have a difficult time listening to Laura Ingraham when she is in a negative head space. And that prolonged period when she was ill and in a negative head space moved me to stop listening.

It occurred to me that with all the MSM chuckling at Kellyanne Conway over her mistaken "Bowling Green Massacre," that maybe she conflated those arrests of terrorist plotters with the Chattanooga massacre, also by a Muslim immigrant. I kind of wish she'd come back with that, pointing out that these two incidents do not exactly make the case for open borders.

MM, there certainly is a conflict between the 2 district courts--I anticipate by Monday the 9th Circuit will overrule the Seattle Ct because that decision is nuts. If it doesn't I expect a swift move to the SCOTUS for an emergency hearing.

Just to be clear, I don't slavishly agree with Levin on everything. I think he went off half cocked on the Australia thing and expect him to pull back when he gets more facts about what really happened. That said, I think he's right about the strange messages.

Someone who hangs up on callers isn't exactly reasonable, in my opinion.

Full disclaimer: I got into it with Levin when he posted on Free Republic as holdonow. My particular disagreement was with his attack on Bush's lawyers for using the equal treatment theory to challenge the recount. It turned out I was right and Levin was wrong, which made him even angrier with me.

So, I don't like him. I don't think he is helpful. If you guys see reasonable discourse in his rants, well, that's fine.

I do not. I don't listen to him anymore. I will decide how to be critical of President Trump by myself. I do tink he should be given a little more than 2 weeks before judgement is passed.

whats most striking to me, Clarice (and also to Scott at PL) is that the opinion is ENTIRELY conclusory and almost entirely free of any legal analysis. The contrast with the judgment of the district court in Mass could hardly be more striking.

Talk show host, best in my lifetime that I've listened to was Bill Wattenberg of KCBS before they cleansed every thinking human being from their payroll.

Dude was a brilliant man. Even tempered and shredded fools regularly without a rise in his blood pressure.

"Willard Harvey Wattenburg (born February 9, 1936), better known as Dr. Bill Wattenburg or Dr. Bill, is an inventor, engineer, author, and radio talk show host residing in the Sierra Nevada region of California. Advertisements for his show often referred to him as "The Smartest Man in the World." [1] --- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Wattenburg

Jerusalem Post quoting unamed "WH official":
"With that in mind, we urge all parties to refrain from taking unilateral actions that could undermine our ability to make progress, including settlement announcements,” the official added. “The administration needs to have the chance to fully consult with all parties on the way forward.”

Buckeye - that music is beautiful! Thank you so much for sharing the link. Feb. 8th is the one-year anniversary of the suicide of a young man who was very close to us. He was the director of our local 4-H camp, dearly loved and an outstanding 26 year old. I plan to send the links to his mom and girlfriend this week.

I'm so glad you were able to be there for him. The presence of a long time friend is a balm that soothes beyond words in these horrible circumstances.

DebinNC, do you remember if the Spivey Choir has performed any of his music? It certainly sounds like a style Martha would love!

I wish there were consequences for judges that make such ridiculous rulings.

This is the hellish aftermath of Marbury v Madison. One unelected black robed tyrant overrules everything. When one branch of the government GAVE ITSELF THE RIGHT TO OVERRULE THE OTHERS it should have started the second revolution. We have been screwed ever since and it's a testament to the rest of the country that we've done so well.

Donald Trump has "angered feminists all over again," this time for comments he did not make. The outrage originated from an Axios report Thursday that quoted an unnamed source who claimed to have worked for the Trump campaign who said, "Trump likes the women who work for him 'to dress like women.'"

"Even if you're in jeans, you need to look neat and orderly," the source added. Men also should be "sharply dressed."

I have a question about Trump's tweet where he asks why aren't the lawyers looking at and using the Federal Court decision in Boston...what lawyers is he referring to? His administrations? If so why doesn't he or somebody in the administration talk to them??? I'm confused about that.

Buckeye, Craig's "Thy Will Be Done" is an Easter standard, especially in churches that have a Maundy Thursday service like the one where our son in law is organist. It begins ~1 hr:4min mark in last year's service.

There's a new acting AG who ought to be able to do something. It can't be that all those DoJ lawyers were hired by Zippy. That would imply he fired all of the ones there under W. The top positions are political appointees, but I would think the staff attorneys are civil service.

TLG , MM and others: i think he was also referring to the lawyers at DHS; questioning why, faced with opposing District Court level opinions from Seattle and Massachusetts, they had chosen to abide by the Seattle (joke) opinion rather than the correctly-argued decision from Mass.